


hanging gardens

by ShowMeAHero



Category: IT (1990), IT - Stephen King, Stranger Things (TV 2016)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Canon-Typical Violence, Car Accidents, Domestic, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Established Relationship, F/M, Family, Family Feels, Fluff, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Post-Canon
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-07-29
Updated: 2020-09-19
Packaged: 2021-03-06 03:00:21
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 12,942
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25596163
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ShowMeAHero/pseuds/ShowMeAHero
Summary: In December of 1987, Operation Hanging Gardens is launched. It’s believed to have failed.It hasn’t.
Relationships: Eddie Kaspbrak/Richie Tozier, Joyce Byers/Jim "Chief" Hopper
Comments: 48
Kudos: 40





	1. detonation

**Author's Note:**

> this is the outrageously self-indulgent it/st crossover featuring 90s eddie and joyce being a monster fighting duo to protect their families that you never thought to want, but always needed to have

Between 1986 and 1987, the United States government launched a series of fourteen nuclear tests they called Operation Musketeer. At the Nevada Test Site, on February 11th, 1987, the United States military detonated an atomic weapon.

Later that year, a series of thirteen nuclear tests called Operation Touchstone was launched, including Touchstone Kearsarge, a test that was part of the Joint Verification Experiment between the United States and the Soviet Union. The goal of the experiment and tests like Touchstone Kearsarge was to reveal the secrets of these two nations to one another: data was revealed about both U.S. and Soviet nuclear test sites, so nobody could break their compliance with the Threshold Test Ban Treaty.

The Threshold Test Ban Treaty was also known as the Treaty on the Limitation of Underground Nuclear Weapon Tests. It established a nuclear threshold in 1974 in order to stop either country from destroying the other. By prohibiting nuclear tests of devices over a certain strength, the U.S. and Russia ensured they would live at least another day.

Of course, neither country followed the exact rules of the treaty. Though the Nevada Test Site was being monitored by the Soviets, it was far from the only testing site in the nation. Underground nuclear testing sites in North Dakota, Indiana, Oregon, Maine, New York, Massachusetts, and Delaware were testing atomic weapons at the same time.

In December of 1987, Operation Hanging Gardens is launched. It’s believed to have failed.

It hasn’t.

* * *

“Let’s go!” Richie calls from downstairs. Eddie helps Elizabeth into her second shoe, even though she’s clearly barely resisting the urge to throw it across the room.

“We’re coming!” Eddie shouts back. He turns back to Betty and asks, “C’mon, will you just bend your leg for me a little bit?” She evaluates him for a moment before she nods, lifting her leg so he can fix the heel of her shoe. “There you go.  _ Thank _ you.”

“You’re welcome,” Betty replies. He straps the top of her shoe on and pulls her up into his arms as he stands. “When’s school over?”

“Not until three o’clock, sweetheart,” Eddie tells her. It’s the same question every day; Betty, even at only five years old, has already started exhibiting the same anti-school attitudes that Richie was expressing at her age. Eddie has such dread for the future with her. He knows getting schoolwork done on time will be a nightmare.

When he gets to the bottom of the stairs, Richie and Adam are both looking at him expectantly. Their fourteen-year-old son hasn’t quite managed to grow any facial hair yet like his father, but he’s still the spitting image of Richie. They’re even both making almost the exact same face, right now. Eddie finds it as eerie as he does charming.

“Sorry about that. Someone didn’t want to put their shoes on,” Eddie tells them, setting Betty down by the door. Richie grabs her coat off the hook and starts pulling her arms through the sleeves.

“Was it you?” Richie asks. Adam laughs.

“Oh, of course,” Eddie replies. As he’s tugging his own shoes on, he looks over his shoulder. “Where’s Laurie?”

“She went to the bathroom,” Adam tells him. Betty grabs her brother’s hand, and he lets her, even though he makes a face like he wants to yank it away. Eddie’s privately very proud of him; he’s sure a young Richie  _ would’ve  _ yanked his hand away. A young Eddie certainly would have.

“Laurie, we’ve gotta go or we’re gonna be late!” Richie shouts down the hall. He pushes open the front door and asks, “Eds, will you go grab her while I strap Betty in?”

“Sure,” Eddie says. He listens for his daughter, but he can’t hear anything as he gets closer to the bathroom door. For a moment, he waits; when he still doesn’t hear her, he knocks. “Laurie?”

“Just a second!” she calls back. Eddie leans against the wall, tapping his fingers against his wrist. He still doesn’t hear anything. He frowns, shifting to rap his knuckles against the door again.

“Laurie, are you okay?” Eddie asks. There’s a beat of silence where she doesn’t answer, and Eddie’s heart starts to race. “Can I come in?”

There’s still silence for a long moment before he hears her quietly answer, “Yes.” He pushes open the door and finds her sitting on the bathroom floor in front of their toilet, still with her coat and backpack on. Eddie goes right to her, kneeling down in front of her, pressing the back of his hand to her forehead.

“Why didn’t you tell me you weren’t feeling well, baby?” Eddie asks. He cups her face in his hands, letting himself feel her cheeks. She feels like she’s burning up. “Oh, honey, you’ve got a fever.”

“I’m sorry,” Laurie tells him tearfully. She sniffles, wiping at her nose with the back of her wrist; Eddie shushes her, pulling her head in against his chest.

“It’s okay, don’t be sorry,” Eddie tells her. “Let me tell your dad to take your brother and sister to school, I’ll stay with you, okay?”

“I’m so sorry, Daddy,” Laurie repeats, tears finally spilling over her red cheeks. Eddie strokes her hair back from her face, kisses the crown of her head. His hands are shaking and his heart is pounding, but it’s not as horrible as it had been the first time Adam ever got sick when he was just a newborn. Eddie’s gotten better and better over the last fourteen years at staying calm while he takes care of one of his sick kids. That doesn’t stop him from being terrified for them, and upset that they’re in pain, and distraught that he can’t fix everything for them whenever it happens again.

“You’ve got nothing to be sorry for,” Eddie says. He pulls her backpack off, tugs her jacket down her arms and takes them both with him. “Stay right here, I’ll get your pajamas and come back, and we’ll go to the doctor. Okay?”

“Okay,” Laurie whispers softly. She lays down on the floor, her cheek against the tile, looking so pitiful that Eddie’s heart breaks.

Eddie jogs to the open front door and sticks his head out into the light fall of snow outside. He can feel snowflakes sticking and melting in his hair, freezing-cold, as he shouts, “Richie, come here, please!”

Richie’s head pops up from the far side of their car. When he runs back to Eddie, his cheeks are flushed nearly as red as his hair with the cold.

“What’s up?” Richie asks. Eddie motions with Laurie’s coat and backpack in his hands. “Aw, what happened?”

“She’s sick,” Eddie tells him. Richie frowns, shoving his hands into the pockets of his jacket and looking over Eddie’s shoulder back into the house. “She’s got a fever, so I thought I’d just take her in, have Dr. Adams take a quick look at her.”

“That’s probably a good idea,” Richie says. He’s clearly still hesitant to leave, so Eddie pushes up onto the balls of his feet and catches his eye. Richie huffs, deflating. “I shouldn’t have yelled at her to—”

“You didn’t yell at her,” Eddie assures him. “She’s not upset, she’ll be just fine. Probably just a stomach bug, you know how they pick things up in the winter like this, especially so close to the holidays.”

“Yeah,” Richie says. He exhales sharply, then says, “Yeah, yeah, you’re right, Eds.”

“She’ll be just fine,” Eddie tells him, even though his heart’s still pounding. He leans around Richie and waves to the car, shouts, “Have a good day at school, I love you!”

“Aren’t you coming?” Adam calls back, as Betty shouts “Where’s Laurie?” over him.

Eddie’s a sucker at heart, and he knows it; he goes out to the car so he can lean in and tell them, “Your sister’s not feeling well so she’s not going to school today. You two have a nice day and I’ll pick you up after school, okay?”

“Okay,” Adam replies.

“At three, right?” Betty asks.

“Yes, at three,” Eddie tells her. Betty leans in so he can kiss her on the cheek; after a moment where Adam seems to debate it, he lets him do the same. Eddie smiles at them both when he tells them, “Love you, be good to your father.”

“No!” Betty exclaims.

“Hey, watch it,” Richie says over Eddie’s shoulder. Betty shrieks with laughter, hiding her face in the hood of her coat. When Eddie turns, Richie’s right there. “Good luck with her, Eddie Spaghetti.”

“Thanks,” Eddie says. Richie tips Eddie’s chin up with a finger underneath so he can give him a kiss.

“See you for lunch?” Richie asks. Eddie grins.

“See you,” Eddie says, and Richie kisses him one last time before he climbs into the car. Eddie waves at them as they drive off and disappear down the street.

When he turns back inside, he moves quickly. It’s only a couple of minutes before he’s bringing Laurie’s pajamas and a blanket down to her in the bathroom. He finds her up over the toilet now, crying, so he leaves her clothes by the door and just goes to her. He sweeps her hair back from her face when she’s sick, holding her little nine-year-old body up when she leans into him.

When she stops getting sick, she pushes back from the toilet so she can climb into his lap, and he lets her. He just keeps stroking his fingers through her hair, massaging her scalp as she catches her breath.

“Feel any better?” Eddie asks her. She shrugs. “Yeah, thought so. Want to get some pajamas on?”

“Yeah,” she answers quietly. He helps her stand and washes her face for her in the sink. The repetitive motion of the washcloth soaked in cold water as he sweeps it over her face seems to calm her down a bit, and she leans into him again, shivering.

“What else hurts?” Eddie asks. She shrugs again. “Does your head hurt?”

“Yeah,” she says again. “And my throat, and my knees, kind of.”

“Hmm.” Eddie wipes her hot forehead with the washcloth again. “It’s probably just the flu. Is anyone sick in your class?”

“Linda H. was out on Tuesday,” Laurie tells him. He tips her head up so he can look into her eyes, pulling her lower lids down a bit with his thumbs to examine them. For her part, she just lets him do it, slumping tiredly into him as he cradles her face.

“I’ll have to call her mother after we get home later, see what she took to get better,” Eddie says. Laurie just nods tiredly; Eddie takes that as a hint to start getting her into her pajamas so he can bundle her into the car. She doesn’t protest him undressing and redressing her, limbs moving limply like a rag doll’s. Her face shines with a feverish pink brightness when he checks her eyes again. “You really don’t feel good, honey, do you?”

“No,” she says, tears filling her eyes again. Eddie pulls her into a hug; she buries her face in his chest, burning all over, a wet spot soaking through his shirt. He just rubs her back, strokes her hair, softly quiets her down.

“It’s gonna be okay,” Eddie tells her. She hiccups, wiping her face on his shirt. When she’s breathing evenly again, he grabs her blanket and wraps it around her, snug about her shoulders. She looks up at him, blonde curls spilling into her little face as she sniffles again. He just ducks right down and picks her up, letting her wrap her legs around his waist like she did when she was smaller. He doesn’t really carry her much anymore — Richie will toss her around when they’re roughhousing, but Eddie is more of a referee in those scenarios — but he’s pleased to find that he can still lift her.

He only stops to pull her heavier winter coat off the hook by the door before grabbing his keys and his wallet on his way out. Laurie keeps her head on his shoulder, face buried in his throat. He’s glad he can feel her even puffs of breath against his neck so he can keep track of her. She makes a soft whimpering sound when he gently sets her down in the back seat of his car, but she doesn’t fight him otherwise.

One of the mixtapes Richie made for the kids to listen to in their cars is still in the player, so Eddie turns that on when he starts the engine. As the heat kicks on, his skin prickles, as if someone has entered the car with them: an energy he can’t place. He looks in his rearview, then twists around just to check, but the only one there is Laurie, buckled in and huddled up in her blanket.

He passes back one of the empty shopping bags he keeps in the front seat for trash and tells her, “If you need to be sick, you can be sick in this, okay?”

“Okay,” she says, taking it from him. He turns the music down to let it settle at a soft hum when the heat kicks on, hoping it’ll settle his nerves.

It doesn’t. If anything, he feels even more on edge. He doesn’t have a choice, though; they’ve got to go to the pediatrician, because a fever is concerning no matter what. Eddie reminds himself he’s  _ not  _ overreacting,  _ any  _ parent would do this. He chalks up his paranoia to— well, paranoia. He’s on edge because he’s worried, because of  _ course  _ he is.

He’s not even sure what happens. He’s driving and then, suddenly, he’s not; the steering wheel spins out from under his hands like somebody’s jerked it away, and he grabs it back, yanking on it. His heart jumps into his throat when the wheel locks and doesn’t move. With all the strength he has, he tugs at the wheel again, but his tires spin out under them and he can’t manage to get control of the car.

Then, abruptly, the road seems to shake. Eddie feels like he can see heat lines, the air wavering like a mirage, even though it’s snowing harder than it had been when he left home. The car hits a patch of ice, and the trees and road spin past them too quickly for Eddie to see anymore.

He hears Laurie scream. His hands are numb with panic, but he twists around and grabs her hand as fast as he can.

“You’re going to be okay,” he tells her, loud, urgent. She’s crying when they hit whatever it is they hit. Eddie doesn’t know; he gets knocked out almost instantly.

* * *

A phone call wakes Joyce up in the middle of the night. She’s not sure who it is; she misses the phone the first time it rings, and the second time it starts up, she just barely manages to get to it in time.

“Hello?” she asks, rubbing tiredly at her eyes with the back of her wrist. The floor’s cold underneath her feet, and she can’t help but shiver.

“Hey, honey,” Jim says on the other end. Joyce sighs, yawning as she leans into the wall, letting her eyes close again.

“Hey,” Joyce replies. “What’re you calling for? You’re gonna wake the whole house up.”

“I don’t mind,” Jim says. Joyce is immediately on alert, eyes snapping open, jerking upright ramrod-straight. “Can you check on them for me, actually? Just— make sure everyone’s okay?”

“Okay, but then you’re going to tell me what’s going on,” Joyce says. Jim agrees, so she sets the receiver down and goes to do as he’s asked. The house they bought together isn’t much larger than her last one, but it’s enough for each of the kids to have their own room.

Jonathan is actually in his room, for the first time since Thanksgiving, being back from New York for the winter break. When Joyce sticks her head in, he doesn’t move at all; she can see him asleep curled up on his side. As her eyes adjust to the darkness, she can see his chest rising and falling, his blankets shifting as he moves slightly and breathes. She pads into the room anyways to check on him, brushing his hair back from his face. His expression relaxes slightly, his shoulders falling back as he pushes his face into his pillow. She withdraws her hands to let him rest.

Jonathan’s room is right next to Jane’s; Joyce pushes her door open slowly, but Jane wakes up anyways, blinking and sitting up in bed to stare at her with wide eyes.

“Mom?” Jane asks blearily. Joyce goes right to her, coaxing her to lay back down in bed.

“Shh,” Joyce says. “Just checking on you.”

“Bad dream?” Jane asks. She closes her eyes easily when her head hits the pillow, then forces them back open to watch Joyce again.

“Something like that,” Joyce tells her. Jane frowns, her brow furrowing; she might be sixteen, but Joyce still sees the little girl in her just like she can’t help but see the little boy in Jonathan and Will. “Get some rest, honey, okay? You’ve got school in the morning.”

“Okay,” Jane agrees easily. She yawns, then says, “Love you.”

“Love you, too,” Joyce says. She sits on the edge of the bed and keeps stroking Jane’s hair until she falls back asleep. It doesn’t take too long; once she’s asleep again, she moves on to Will’s room across the hall. He sleeps just as soundly as his brother, but he’s all spread out, flat on his stomach, one arm around his pillow, blankets tangled around his legs. Joyce takes the time to straighten them out before she checks his back.

When she lays her palm on his back, she can feel it rising and falling. She strokes his hair back from his face to find him looking pale. Frowning, she crouches down, examining his cheeks, his skin. He doesn’t look sick or feverish, just— concerned, or worried about something. Afraid, maybe. She puts the back of her hand against his forehead, but he’s not overly warm.

She strokes his cheek with her thumb. “Will?”

He doesn’t wake up, but he does relax a bit. Instead of waking, he shifts, pushing the pillow away and turning onto his side. Joyce removes her hand, then kisses the top of his head.

“Sleep well, baby,” she whispers. He still doesn’t stir, but she leaves feeling like she helped a little. She’s still unsettled, finding him like that; everything Will feels puts her on edge, it seems sometimes.

Her last stop is Michelle’s room. She hates to call Michelle the reason she and Hopper got married, because they would’ve gotten married eventually, but their four-year-old daughter is definitely the reason they got married as quickly as they did. She, unfortunately, does not sleep as heavily as her brothers, which caused them a lot of trouble when she was a baby.

Now, she doesn’t wake up until Joyce is practically over her. She doesn’t startle at all; she just smiles, reaching her hands up for Joyce.

“Hi, Mickey,” Joyce says quietly. She reaches in to lift her up, bringing her to settle on her hip. Mickey buries her face in Joyce’s throat, yawning.

“Good morning,” Mickey tells her.

“It’s not morning yet, baby,” Joyce says. “I just wanted to check on you.”

“Why?” Mickey asks.

“Because I was bored,” Joyce says. Mickey laughs, wrapping her hands up in Joyce’s shirt. Well, technically it’s Jim’s shirt, but she’s worn it to bed for the last couple years. It’s as good as hers. “Wanna go back to sleep?”

“Can I go with you?” Mickey asks, lifting her head to look up at her. Joyce hesitates. She knows she  _ should  _ say no; she’s taught kids how to sleep in their own bed before, she knows what to do, but she can’t help feeling unsettled, too.

“Sure thing,” Joyce says. Mickey drops her head back down. “We’re going to make a quick stop first, though, okay?”

“Okay,” Mickey agrees. Joyce hoists her up further on her hip again before heading back to the phone.

“Hop?” Joyce asks.

“Yeah, hey,” Jim says on the other end. “Is everyone okay?”

“They’re all breathing,” Joyce tells him. He exhales sharply, audibly relieved, and her anxiety spikes. “Jane and Mickey both woke up, and Will looked a little… I don’t know, maybe he’s having a bad dream. Why? What’s going on?”

“We don’t know yet,” Jim says. “We’re getting all sorts of calls about power going out, weird shit happening out on the road, two car accidents, a fucking hawk flying into someone’s  _ living room—” _

“Wait, wait, wait,” Joyce cuts him off. “What does this have to do with the kids?”

Jim’s quiet for a beat. Then, he says, “Don’t panic, okay?”

“I’m already panicking,” she says, “so just tell me.”

“We don’t know what it is, but we think it’s something to do with the old labs,” Jim tells her.

_ “With the—” _

“I  _ said  _ don’t panic, okay!” Jim cuts her off. Joyce huffs, trying to keep herself from acting too agitated while Mickey’s still awake and watching her so closely. “We don’t even know for sure if it was or not yet. It’s just better to be safe than sorry and I had a bad feeling, alright?”

“You had a bad feeling?” Joyce asks. “What kind of a bad feeling?”

Ever since Jim came back, he gets these good feelings and bad feelings, inclinations in one direction or another. Those feelings are almost always true, if not  _ always  _ true. Joyce hasn’t actually done the math, but she thinks something changed in the process of him returning to them. She’s not sure what, but she doesn’t care overly much; she’s just eternally glad he’s here.

“Just a bad feeling,” Jim answers. “I felt like I should call and check on you guys. Something felt off.”

Joyce fidgets with the phone cord, shifting her weight before she just says, “Well, you know, you could just come home.”

“I’ll be home before morning,” Jim tells her, same as he always does when he’s on nights. “As long as everyone’s alright, I’m not worried. I just wanted to check.”

“Everyone’s alright,” Joyce echoes tentatively. Jim getting a bad feeling gives  _ her  _ a prickly bad feeling, too. “I’m taking Mickey to bed with me, so be careful coming back home.”

“Don’t sleep on me, Daddy,” Mickey says near the mouthpiece. Jim laughs; it makes Joyce feel a little bit better, but only a little.

“I won’t, sweet pea,” he replies. “As long as you stay off my side.”

“No!” Mickey exclaims. Joyce shushes her, laughing herself.

“Okay, goodnight,” Jim says. “Be safe, okay? Make sure the doors are locked, just for my piece of mind.”

“I will,” Joyce tells him. “Goodnight, Hop. Love you.”

“Love you,” he replies. He hangs up first, and she’s just left holding the receiver, listening to the dial tone, skin crawling.

“Bedtime,” Mickey reminds her, when she hasn’t moved for a minute. Joyce nods, hanging up.

“Right, you’re right, sorry,” she says. “Bedtime’s right. C’mon.”

When Joyce is laying Mickey down on Jim’s side of the bed, she feels like the air around her gets charged. Her gut instinct is to go check on Will; it feels like it had when the Gate opened, when they were close and could feel the energy it was giving off. It makes her  _ bones _ ache.

“Lay down, baby,” Joyce tells Mickey, settling her against Jim’s pillow. Mickey goes easily, watching Joyce with big, dark eyes as she goes back into the hallway. She pushes Will’s door open again, just to check, but just as she does, it feels like the whole house shakes.

Joyce grabs Will’s doorframe, heart starting to race. A million different thoughts and ideas go into her brain first, but her first is to go back to Mickey and snatch her up. When she runs back into the hall with her in her arms, Jane and Jonathan are already there.

“Go into Will’s room,” Joyce instructs them. They both hesitate, so she shouts,  _ “Go!”  _ and they both run through his open doorway.

“What’s going on?” Will asks, the second they’re all in his room. He’s sitting up in bed, looking alarmed, face nearly bloodless except for his pink cheeks. He looks like he’s shaking, so Joyce passes Mickey off to Jonathan and goes to Will instead.

“Do you feel okay?” Joyce asks.

“What’s happening?” Will asks again, ignoring her question. His wide eyes jump away from hers when the house shakes again.

Jane whimpers softly, still standing by the door. Joyce reaches out to her, and Jane runs to her, ducking under her arm and twining her arms around Joyce’s waist.

“We have to get somewhere safe,” Jonathan tells them. Joyce’s eyes flit around the room before she lands on Will’s closet.

“The closet,” she says. “Get up, c’mon, go, go, Will, c’mon—”

Joyce drags them to the closet, wrenching open the door and tearing out armfuls of clothes and old toys. Will and Jane help him, tossing everything into a heap on the floor until the closet is empty and the five of them can climb inside safely, the door shut tight behind them. The house shakes again, and Joyce thinks it should feel like an earthquake, but it doesn’t. It feels more like a vibration.

“What’s going on, Mom?” Jonathan asks. Joyce shakes her head.

“I don’t know,” she says. He passes Mickey back over to her, and she clings in her lap, wrapping her arms close around Joyce’s neck. When Joyce looks to Will, Jane, and Jonathan in the darkness, she can see the whites of their eyes reflected back to her. She can feel resolve gather in her chest, tight with fear. “It’s going to be okay, though. Alright? I’m going to keep you safe.”

Mickey tightens her grip. Jane starts to say, “But we—”, but Joyce shushes her.

“You’re my daughter,” she tells her. Jane’s eyes go glassy with tears, but she nods all the same. “It’s  _ my  _ job to keep  _ you  _ safe. All of you. Okay? So you’re going to have to listen to me.”

“Okay,” Jane breathes.

“Mom, we should—”

“Jonathan,” Joyce cuts him off. “I need you to—”

The house vibrates again, the air going fuzzy around them. Joyce gathers Mickey’s face into her chest.

“What’s happening?” Will asks, voice trembling. Joyce shakes her head.

“I don’t know,” she tells him. “I don’t know.”

The house seems to surge, throbbing and groaning around them, and Joyce reaches out, pulling them into her arms. She’s not big enough to get her arms all the way around them, but she can feel each of them in their small huddle on the closet floor, and it’s enough to secure her, for now. The house shakes once more, and she buries her face in Mickey’s hair, holding them all tight.


	2. fallout

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> When Eddie wakes up, his first thought is, _Richie needs to get his elbow off my neck._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> >:3

When Eddie wakes up, his first thought is, _Richie needs to get his elbow off my neck._

His second thought is that he’s very cold, and his third thought is mostly nonverbal, but could be summarized as a staticky _fuck._ He takes a shuddering breath in, his tight chest feeling like it’s crinkling as he does, before he forces his eyes open.

For a hysterical second, all he can see is white, and he thinks that he’s died, maybe. When he tries to focus, he realizes the white is snow and sky and ground, blurring together in his hazy vision. The more he wakes up, the more he becomes aware of the pain coursing through his veins and throbbing through his limbs. He shivers, cold seeping into his bones.

Eddie tries to make his mouth move, but he can’t. Slowly, _slowly,_ he comes back to himself; his chest jolts with heat and fear when he remembers the accident.

“Laurie,” Eddie manages, his voice sounding cracked and mushed. He pushes at whatever’s pinning him in place, but he can’t get it to move. Something is pushing on the back of his neck, and he knows now he’s _not_ in bed and it’s _not_ Richie, but he’s sideways in his car staring out the broken windshield.

“Daddy!” Laurie exclaims. “Daddy, stay awake, please stay awake, please don’t fall asleep again—”

“Mm,” Eddie cuts her off. He takes a slow breath, then tries again. “I’m okay. Are you okay?”

“I hit my head,” Laurie tells him. Eddie feels a pulse of adrenaline course through his body, making him shake. “My seatbelt’s stuck, I can’t get out, Daddy, help me, what do I do?”

Eddie reaches down and yanks at his own seatbelt with his one free arm. The way he’s hanging to the side, his left arm is trapped underneath him, pinned by another part of the car. Something’s broken, he can feel it, but he just grits his teeth and pushes into the button on his seatbelt. It doesn’t retract. His heart starts racing sluggishly, trying to push harder and faster, but he’s struggling.

“Hold on,” Eddie drags out. He tears at the seatbelt again, his heart pounding with pain and the desperation to get to Laurie and get her out of the car. With a pained grunt, he rips the seatbelt out of the frame of the car. His whole body falls out of his seat, slamming into the side-bottom of the car. For a brief moment, he just lays there and catches his breath; then, he forces himself upright, taking stock of where they are and what’s going on.

He realizes that, wherever they spun out, they collided with a tree broadside and the car flipped. He’s not sure how far they went, but it’s clear they’re off the road. The car’s laying on its side now, all the windows smashed, the front and the driver’s side crunched up. Eddie takes stock of himself second; he knows his arm is probably broken, and that his chest and his head are screaming with pain. He manages to get his other arm under him and gets himself turned around towards the backseat.

Laurie has a bruise starting to swell on her cheek, but otherwise, she looks okay. Eddie exhales shakily and crawls into the backseat.

“I’m gonna get you out of here, okay?” Eddie tells her. She nods, tears and snot and snow smeared across her face. He’s glad there’s no blood but he knows he needs to get her out of the car as soon as he can. “Can you help me?”

“Okay,” Laurie says, voice breaking. “What do I do?”

“I need you to hold onto the seat,” Eddie tells her. “Hold on, okay? So you won’t fall.”

“Okay,” Laurie breathes again. She clings to the seat beside her, arms pale with the cold, her feverish cheeks and eyes bright and filled with tears. Eddie shifts himself further into the backseat; he can barely feel the pain anymore, his whole brain focusing on getting to Laurie and getting her out.

His right hand, his good hand, has blood on it when he reaches up for the seatbelt. She’s right, it’s gotten stuck between two snapped parts of the back half of the car’s frame. It looks like the pieces narrowly missed her, and Eddie has a spike of nausea surge through him. He manages to get his fingers wrapped around the belt and he just pulls hard, harder, until it gives and pulls away from her body.

“Okay, come here,” Eddie tells her, holding his arm up. Laurie hesitantly lets go of the seat, lowering herself down into Eddie’s arm until he can wrap it tightly around her waist. He gets as good a grip on her as he can, then says, “We’re going to go out the side, okay?”

“Okay,” she agrees. “Which way?”

Eddie pushes her upwards, towards the snow he can see above their heads, and she takes the hint and starts to climb. He’s amazed and proud and shaken to watch her drag herself up and out, limbs shaking, before she turns back and reaches her hands down for him.

“Daddy, come on,” she begs him, fingers grasping. Eddie reaches for her, but the car frame buckles under her weight where she’s sitting on it up on top. She screams, clinging to the car, her hands shooting away.

“You have to get away from the car,” Eddie tells her.

“But you’re—”

“Laurie, _go,”_ Eddie tells her, as firmly as he can manage. “Jump down to the ground and go to the road and try to wave someone down, okay? I’m going to be out of here in a minute, don’t worry.”

He doesn’t know where all that air and energy came from, but he’s just glad he managed to get it out for Laurie to hear. She seems to take it in and gather herself up before nodding.

“You can do this, baby,” he tells her. His head is starting to hurt again, his chest feeling tighter and tighter. As soon as he hears Laurie’s feet crunch into the snow next to the car, he slumps down, giving up on holding himself upright any longer.

Laurie’s face appears right in front of his eyes, eyes big and worried, hair spilling into both of their faces. “Daddy?”

“I’m okay,” Eddie tells her. “Be careful on the road. Look both ways if you cross.”

Laurie nods jerkily before she pushes herself to her feet and runs away. He can hear her feet in the snow, one beating, fast step at a time. She stops close by; he can hear her shouting, but he can’t really make out what she’s saying. The longer he listens, the fuzzier her voice gets until he feels like he can’t hear anything at all except wind and snow and static.

His arm and chest and head and legs ache more and more each moment. The pain’s starting to seep back into his blood and his bones, now that the adrenaline is wearing off, and he wants to scream or cry out. Instead, he forces himself to bury his face in the cushion nearest to his head and muffles the gasping breaths tearing up out of his throat.

Something near him shakes. Eddie forces his eyes open, lifting his head just a bit. He can’t see anything, but the car and the ground all feel like they’re trembling around him. Hot fear lances through him again. He starts trying to pull himself upright, trying to slide out of the car, but the piece he grabs buckles under his hand and snaps apart with the shrieking screech and grind of metal.

Eddie releases the frame and slams back into the car beneath him. His head smacks into something, he doesn’t see what, but he groans, pain shooting down his spine from his temple, through his head. Hands shaking, he reaches for the window again, trying to crawl out. One last ditch effort. He still can’t manage it.

He wants to say, “Shit,” because it feels like the only appropriate thing to say, but he can’t get his mouth and throat to work anymore. Breath shuddering, he closes his eyes.

* * *

“The house _shook,”_ Jim repeats.

“Yes, Hop, the house _shook,”_ Joyce tells him for the hundredth time. Jim buries his face in his hands over the breakfast table, rubbing at his eyes for a moment before he looks up at them.

“It did,” Jane adds. She looks exhausted, same as Joyce feels. Will’s still got his head pillowed on his arms, staring blankly out the kitchen window, his mind somewhere else. Joyce wants to reach out to him, but she knows better. She just puts her hand between his shoulder blades and rubs a slow circle there until he closes his eyes.

“What do we do?” Jonathan asks. “Should we go back to the labs and make sure it’s all gone?”

“First of all,” Jim says, “there’s no _we_ here. We’re not working together on this—”

“But—”

“I don’t think—”

“Jim, you—”

“Hey, _hey!”_ Jim shouts over them, throwing his hands up above his head. Everybody goes quiet again. “Who’s the chief of police?”

“I’m twenty years old,” Jonathan reminds him.

“And you’re still my son, and I’m not letting you put yourself in danger _again,”_ Jim says pointedly. “This is _not_ your responsibility.” He looks the kids over, then adds, _“None_ of you.”

“Dad—”

“Especially not you,” Jim cuts Jane off. “You’re always sticking your nose in. You’re gonna get yourself hurt.”

“But I can _help,”_ Jane argues. Joyce just watches it all, still rubbing Will’s back. He’s opened his eyes again to watch the discussion, but he hasn’t contributed yet.

“Really, if something’s going on, you’re going to need all the help you can get,” Jonathan points out. Joyce bites back the smile she almost lets out at that. She’s proud of all her kids all the time, of course, but she’s particularly proud right now.

Jim looks at her, then, and the smile drops off her face. He sees it anyways. “This isn’t funny, Joyce!”

“No!” she exclaims. “No, no, I know, I’m not laughing, I’m not laughing at you! I’m just—” She motions around the table at everybody. Will even lifts his head. “I mean, not for nothing, Hop, but we’ve got a good bunch of kids here.”

Jim throws his arm out in a sweeping motion towards the kids. “What, and you want them to go running off into God knows what just like—”

“No, of _course_ I don’t,” Joyce cuts him off. “I’m just _saying—”_

“I don’t know what you—”

“Mom,” Will says quietly, and Joyce looks away from Jim as he breaks off to look at her son instead. He’s not looking back, though; he’s staring out the window at the bare trees outside, heavy with snow.

“What is it?” Joyce asks. Will shakes his head, eyes flicking back and forth.

“I don’t know,” he tells her. Jane reaches out and grabs his hand, looking in the same direction as him. “I can’t see it.”

“What is it?” Jonathan asks. Mickey watches from his lap, head on his shoulder, staring at Will attentively.

“I don’t know,” Will says.

“Whatever it is is running around us,” Jane tells them. She stands, her eyes darting left, then right, before she looks over her shoulder. “I can’t see it. It feels like it’s far away and close, I don’t know where, though, somewhere— It’s somewhere I don’t recognize, I— I don’t know what it is—”

Jane’s face is red with exertion, her knuckles going white around Will’s hand as she inhales sharply. She swipes blood away from her nose with the back of her wrist before letting go. Will blinks, looking to Joyce tiredly.

“What’d you see?” Joyce asks. Will frowns, his brow furrowing as he looks down, away from anyone’s eyes.

“I couldn’t see anything,” Will tells her. “I could just feel it.”

Joyce’s blood runs cold, her skin breaking out in goosebumps. She strokes Will’s hair back from his eyes, tipping his face up so she can look him in the eye.

“Nothing bad is going to happen to you,” Joyce tells him firmly. “I promise, okay? But you have to make sure you tell us everything so we can help you.”

Will hesitates, but ultimately says, “Okay. Okay, I will.”

Joyce looks to Jane and reaches out, takes her hand, too. “That goes for you, too, honey. Both of you, you tell me or Hop if you see _anything_ weird, _anything.”_

Jane nods. “Okay.”

“Tell the _truth,”_ Joyce says pointedly. Jane bites her lip, then nods again, firmer this time.

“None of that answers the question of what the hell happened here last night,” Jim says. Joyce gets up, just because she can’t stand to sit still anymore.

“Maybe we _should_ drive down there,” Joyce says. Jim throws his hands up, leaning back in his seat at the table, exasperated. “No, I mean, listen. We won’t know anything just sitting around here doing nothing. If we—”

“I don’t know why there’s a _we!”_ Jim exclaims again. “I don’t! I know that _I_ have to look into this, and _I_ have to deal with this, because _I’m_ the chief of police—”

 _“We_ are a family!” Jane explodes, launching to her feet, slamming her hands down on the table. Jim shoots to his feet and does the same, palms coming down with a much heavier _thunk._ The two of them glare at each other.

Mickey bursts into tears. Joyce goes to take her, but Jonathan says, “I got it, Mom,” and pushes away from the table. He looks to Jim for just a second before he leaves the room.

“You’re not an adult, Jane,” Jim reminds her, jaw tight. “You’re sixteen years old—”

“That doesn’t make me helpless!” Jane insists.

“No, but it shouldn’t make you a target, either,” Jim says. “This isn’t what you’re supposed to be doing!”

“It’s what I _want_ to be doing!” Jane argues. Jim groans, hanging his head between his arms. After a long moment, he lifts his head just a bit to glare at Joyce.

“Do you want to add anything?” Jim asks her. Joyce opens her mouth, then closes it, hesitating. She doesn’t want to piss anyone off, but she’s also pretty sure they’re going to end up involved in this anyways, and her number one priority if that happens is to protect the kids.

Her number two priority, however, is to figure out what’s going on and fix it. So, she’s torn.

“Hop should probably go check it out himself to start,” Joyce says, slowly. She nods once, then looks to Jim. “And then—”

 _“No!”_ he interrupts her. “No _and then!”_

“I don’t know why you think you can say no to me, I have a car and free will,” Joyce reminds him. “Women have the right to vote now, you know.”

“This isn’t about that,” Jim insists. “It’s about keeping you safe—”

“It’s about you thinking I’m something _to_ keep safe!” Joyce points out. “What happened to thinking I’d work well down at the station?”

“You’re the one who said you didn’t want to do that right now,” Jim says.

“Yeah, right _now,”_ Joyce says. “I don’t suddenly cease being able to do things because I’ve had another kid, Hop.”

“This _isn’t—”_ Jim starts before cutting himself off with a growl of frustration. He pushes away from the table and says, “You know what? Fine! Fine. Joyce, you can come with me when I drive down to the woods to check on shit.”

“What about us?” Jane asks.

“What _about_ you?” Jim asks. “You have school today.”

“But—” Will starts.

“No buts!” Jim cuts him off. “School’s nonnegotiable.”

Will and Jane both look to Joyce, but she says, “He’s right, kiddos. Sorry.”

Jane groans, shoving her chair back from the table and storming down the hall. They all hear her bedroom door slam shut behind her. Will looks back and forth between the two of them, looking exhausted.

“Is it okay if I just stay home today, actually?” he asks. His eyes end up landing on Joyce, and she reaches out to lay the back of her hand against his forehead. He does feel warm, and she frowns, leaning in to cup his face in her hands.

“You don’t feel well?” she asks. “What hurts?”

“Just my head,” he tells her. “And my stomach. I just feel really tired.”

“Okay,” she says. “Well, yeah, of course, you can stay home.” She hesitates, then looks to Jim. “Hop, you can go on without me. I think I’ll stay here with Will.”

“You don’t have to do that, Mom,” he says, but she frowns, rattling his head just a little bit.

“Don’t argue with her if she wants to stay home,” Jim tells him. “Joyce, yes. Absolutely, stay here. I’ll radio in when I get there and have them call you.”

It’s become old hat by this point. Whenever they go anywhere without each other, they make sure the other one gets the message when they arrive where they’re going. Joyce nods, then prods Will to stand.

“Alright, let’s go,” she tells him. “Back in bed and I’ll bring you flu medicine, some water. Do you want crackers?”

“Sure, yeah,” he says. “Thanks, Mom.”

She pulls his head down to her level so she can kiss his forehead before she lightly pushes him towards the hall. It’s not until she hears his door click shut that she turns to Jim. The two of them just stare each other down, for a moment.

“What?” Jim finally asks. Joyce sighs, rubbing at her elbows through the sleeves of her cardigan.

“I don’t know,” she admits. She rolls her neck, then her shoulders; she can feel the hair standing up along her arms, just like it had last night when the air was starting to get charged. It doesn’t feel as heavy as it did then, but it still makes her uneasy. “I just— I don’t like this, Hop. Something feels wrong about this. Do you know what I mean? Something’s weird.”

“Something’s _always_ weird,” he grumbles, sounding frustrated. Ultimately, though, he sighs, pushing up from the table himself. “Yeah. No, yeah, I know what you mean.”

The two of them are both quiet for another long moment before Jim lifts one hand, holding it out to her. Joyce only hesitates for a moment before she puts her hand in his and lets him tug her in closer. He pulls her in for a hug, her head against his chest as he strokes her hair back. In the quiet moment, he presses a kiss to the top of her head.

“Sorry I snapped at you,” Jim says. “I know you have free will and stuff. I just get really freaked out thinking about something happening to any of you, you know?”

“I know that,” Joyce tells him. There’s a pause before she says, “You shouldn’t yell like that, though.”

“Yeah, I know, I know,” he agrees. “Sorry.”

The two of them are quiet for another beat. They’re broken apart by the phone ringing, and Joyce tips her head up for a kiss before separating from him to answer it.

“Hello?” she asks. There’s a crinkle of static on the other end.

“Hi, Joyce!” Karen Wheeler says on the other end of the line. Joyce twists the cord around her wrist, leaning against the wall. Jim mouths, _Who is it?_ at her, but she just shakes her head and mouths, _Karen._ “Hi, are you working today?”

“No, what is it?” Joyce asks.

“Look, Mike’s just feeling a little bit under the weather, but Ted and I’ve got to take Holly to her Christmas show today,” Karen says. “Would you mind checking in on him around lunch, maybe?”

Joyce taps her nails against the wall, resisting the urge to pick at the edge of the wallpaper with her nail. “You know what, Will’s actually home sick today, too. Why don’t you just drop him off over here?”

“Oh!” Karen exclaims. “Well— If you’re sure? I don’t want to impose on you at all.”

“No, that’s fine,” Joyce says. She leans her forehead into the wall and asks, “Hey, can you ask Mike to bring his radio?”


	3. silver springs

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The living thing eats up the dead things, until there’s nothing blue or bright left, until there’s just blackness. Joyce knows this place; she’s seen it before, and in nightmares since. It’s the Upside Down, the other side, and someone’s standing far in front of her.

Eddie shivers, still freezing cold.

Nobody touches him or says anything. Nobody does anything. He forces his eyes open and sees all white, and dread slinks through his body, icy and intense. His vision is unfocused and he realizes only belatedly that it’s because his glasses aren’t on his face.

Something beeps. He makes his head turn, but pain lances down his spine and he groans, closing his eyes again. Something else beeps, faster this time, and he hears a faint  _ click. _

“Eddie Kaspbrak?” a voice asks. He tries to say yes, but his throat feels thick. He squints instead. “Hi, there.”

It’s only then that Eddie realizes he’s not in the car anymore. He’s laying down on his back, there are lights above his head — he thinks he might be inside.

“Wher’m?” Eddie manages to ask. The voice clarifies into a shape, and then an entire person, dressed in green and pink. A nurse, he thinks, maybe. Probably. “Laurie—”

“Your daughter’s safe,” the nurse cuts him off. “She’s right down the hall with your husband. She’s got a stomach bug and a small concussion, but otherwise she’s fine.”

Eddie settles back against his pillow again. His heart’s racing, pounding painfully in his chest, but he doesn’t think it’ll stop until he’s got Laurie back with him again, until he can be absolutely  _ positive  _ she’s okay. He reaches for his face and pulls at the bandages on his forehead, trying to tug them away from his eyes so he can see better, but the nurse gently pushes his hand away.

“Leave that be for now,” she tells him. “I’ll change it in just a bit. I’m glad you’re awake, because we just got a transfer request for you.”

Eddie furrows his brow. He turns towards the door, tries to pull to stand and reach for it, but the nurse pushes him back again, hands firm but soft against his shoulders.

“Where?” he asks. She sucks in her lips, then looks away from him.

“They didn’t write it on your forms, I’m afraid,” she says. “But I’m sure they’ll tell you more directly before you’re transferred.”

Eddie feels dizzy and confused, but she keeps going, asking him how he feels, checking his pain levels, examining his eyes and his ears and his chest and his head. She rattles off injuries and medications to him, but Eddie could’ve rattled them right back off to her in his sleep. Broken arm, concussion, lacerations stitched up along his chest. He catalogues it all and moves on, his brain already spinning past to more important things.

“Laurie?” he asks again. She pats his hand that’s not in a cast.

“I’ll go see if she’s ready to come see you,” she says. He wants to thank her, but he can’t remember her name or if he even asked what it was, so he just nods and smiles and hopes it’s grateful enough as she goes. He hopes she understands, at least.

The few minutes of being alone are agonizing. Eddie can feel the painkillers the nurse brought seeping into his system, and the pain starts to fade, but the anxiety’s still there, sharp and bright. At least, for the moment, it’s still there.

When the door to his room clicks open, Laurie’s the first one through the door. Richie’s right behind her, warning her, “Hey, hey, be gentle, bucko,” but Laurie throws herself into Eddie’s arms anyways. Eddie’s so glad to have her back with him that he doesn’t even care, ignoring the pain that shoots through his arm so he can hold her close.

“I’m so sorry,” she sobs as soon as she’s with him. “I’m so sorry, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean—”

“No, no, shh,” Eddie shushes her, stroking her hair back from her face. She has a sterile white pad of gauze medically taped onto her cheek, and her hair is a mess, but she looks fine otherwise. Panicked and frightened, maybe, but not hurt. He pushes her back a bit so he can examine her face for himself, cupping her chin in his hand, looking into her eyes. She sniffles.

“Gave us quite a scare, Eddie Spaghetti,” Richie says. His voice is loud and brash but it’s shaking, right in the middle, so Eddie reaches out to him over Laurie’s head. Richie sits right on the edge of the bed and pulls them both in, kissing Eddie hard on the forehead. For the first time that day, Eddie feels like he can properly relax, like the world won’t fall to pieces if he stops trying to hold it together for ten seconds.

“I’m sorry,” Eddie tells him. He doesn’t feel like it’s the right thing to say, nor is it enough, but it’s all he can think of. Richie shakes his head before kissing him properly on the mouth.

“Just know that you’re not allowed to do it again,” Richie says, He cups Eddie’s face in his hands and looks at him for a long,  _ long  _ moment before he exhales shakily and says, “I swear, Eds. You can’t do that to me.”

Eddie feels like his limbs are all shaing out of his control, but he makes himself nod. He tells him, “I’m so sorry. I don’t even—” He coughs, his aching throat pierced with a sharp pain. Laurie all but scrambles off the bed to get a cup of water for him from the sink in the corner. When he can sufficiently breathe again, Eddie says, “I don’t know what happened. I swear to you, Richie, I— It was like the car went out of my control. Like somebody else had grabbed the wheel.”

The way Richie is looking at him screams volumes. He knows they’re both thinking the same thing, and it sets a warning siren off to screeching in Eddie’s head. He can’t quite figure out what’s wrong, he can’t  _ quite  _ remember, but he knows it’s at the edge of his thoughts and at the edges of Richie’s, too. Whatever it is, it’s making his skin  _ crawl. _

“Richie, where are they transferring me?” Eddie asks. Richie’s brow furrowed, confused, concerned.

“Transferring you?” Richie asks. “What do you—”

“Ahh,” a voice says in the door, and Eddie’s jarred away from paying attention to Richie and Laurie to meet the eyes of a doctor instead. His expression also makes Eddie’s skin crawl, even if he can’t place why. “Edward Kaspbrak.”

Richie turns to the door and demands, before Eddie can even inhale, “Are you transferring him?’

The doctor hesitates, for a moment, before he says, “Yes, we are. There’s been a special request.”

“Why?” Richie asks. “The paramedic I talked to said this was the best hospital in the area, why can’t he stay here?”

“They’ll both have to go, actually,” the doctor tells them. Laurie looks to Eddie’s face immediately, eyes wide and filled with fright, face pale.

“Whoa, wait, she’s already all set, I was just about to sign her out,” Richie says.

“They’ll want to examine her, as well,” the doctor says, and Laurie’s hand grabs Eddie’s tight, fisting around the plaster of his cast. Her grip stings his bruised fingers, but he can’t complain. He squeezes her hand back as tight as he can manage.

“Whoa, no, no, you’re not even telling us who  _ they  _ are,” Richie argues. “I’m not letting you take my kid and my husband to some stupid secret hospital to get examined after a stupid car accident. Why can’t they just come home?”

“It’s just to make sure they’re not going to have any lasting aftermath from the event,” the doctor tells him. Eddie’s heart is starting to race again, not improved any by the terrified way Laurie is looking to him, like _he_ knows what’s happening when he doesn’t even know where he is to begin with. He pulls her in closer, wrapping his good arm around her shoulders so he can hide her in his side, like it’ll keep her safe, like nobody can see her there. He feels dazedly disoriented and glad for Richie’s existence.

_ “Hell  _ no, I’m not letting you take them  _ anywhere  _ without telling us where it is and why,” Richie argues. “You can’t just— Can’t just take them wherever you want, that’s— That’s kidnapping, that’s what that is, and you can’t just— She’s  _ nine,  _ she’s a minor, you can’t—”

“I assure you, it’s to make sure they get the best care,” the doctor says. It comes to Eddie that he doesn’t know his name. He didn’t know the nurse’s, either.

“What’s your name?” Eddie asks. His voice scratches out of his throat.

“You don’t remember?” the doctor asks. He clicks his tongue and says, “Well, that’s not very good, I’m afraid. Can I ask if you—”

“You know, I don’t remember your name, either.” Richie leans into Eddie’s space, arms crossed over his chest, putting himself in between the hospital bed and the doctor. After a beat where nobody says anything, Richie sticks his hand out into the middle space and says, “Good to meet you. Richie Tozier.”

The doctor shakes his hand. “I know who you are, Mr. Tozier, thank you.”

“Can’t say I’ve had the same pleasure,” Richie says. The doctor smiles, and Eddie can see Richie’s hackles well and truly go up.

“Mr. Tozier, I don’t want to cut this short, but I do have to take—”

“You don’t  _ have  _ to take anyone anywhere,” Richie insists. “The only person who  _ has  _ to take anyone anywhere is me, and I’m gonna be taking these two home.”

Eddie can hear his own pulse racing on the machine beside him as well as he can feel it pounding in his chest, his throat, his stomach. He clings tighter to Laurie, getting an itching feeling up the back of his neck, creeping up his spine. He wants to scream or lash out, fight or flight, and he has no idea why.

“Please, Mr. Tozier,” Eddie hears, but he doesn’t see. His blurred vision gets blurrier, and he blinks sluggishly. His veins feel like ice water is starting to chug through them, hands trembling, legs shaking all the way up to his hips. He reaches out blindly, finds Laurie and then Richie.

“Richie,” he slurs. The shape of Richie moves down to look at him, cupping his face in his hand again and saying something loudly, sharply, but Eddie can’t make out the individual sounds of it. It’s like they’re speaking two different languages. The touch on Eddie’s face disappears; he reaches out for it, grasps, tries to cling to it, but he’s not even sure he’s actually moving. His eyes are closed, he thinks, and then he’s not really aware of anything. All he feels is cold and fear and then— nothing.

In the nothing, he thinks, there’s a hand in his, so he squeezes it as tightly as he can. The hand is small, and it squeezes him back. He pulls, tugging whoever it is close, closer, until he can bring his hand up to their face. One of his hands won’t move, but one does, and he clings to the soft jaw he finds, the round cheek under his thumb. He knows this face; he has for nearly a decade, he’d know it anywhere.

“Laurie,” he says, into the nothing. She wraps her arms around his chest, fists her hands up in the back of his shirt. He holds onto her like he’ll never let her go; he’s not sure he ever will. He doesn’t know where Richie is. All he knows is, wherever he is, it’s not  _ here.  _ It’s not with them, wherever they are.

The nothing clarifies into something, and he can see her, standing— somewhere. Somewhere he doesn’t recognize, somewhere blue and dark and cold, somewhere wet. He feels like there’s water up past his ankles, it’s so wet and damp, rank like a sewer and rotting like death.

“I got you,” he tells Laurie. The pain in his arm, his back, his head, it’s all still there, but he forces through it. “Hey, honey, can you hear me?”

“Yes,” Laurie tells him. Her voice is watery, too, staticky, drifting closer and further away. Like he’s hearing her when a wave crashes over them at the same time.

He blinks, and he swears, he didn’t have his glasses on before, but he does now. He can see clearly, and the world has turned hazy, ash floating past his head. He doesn’t recognize where they are, but they’re— they’re  _ somewhere,  _ he knows they’re somewhere, and it  _ itches,  _ in his chest, it  _ itches. _

“Hello?” he calls out. He feels like he might be shaking, but he makes himself call out again, demanding,  _ “Hello?” _

Someone shouts back,  _ “Hello?”,  _ and Eddie’s heart starts to race.

“Hello?” Eddie shouts. He makes himself move closer to the voice, pulling Laurie with him. She refuses to let go of her vice grip on him, so he bends and scoops her up, letting her wrap herself around him so tight he barely needs to hold her in place. Desperate, he calls out, “Can you answer me, please?”

That same voice echoes back,  _ “Can you answer me, please?”  _ and Eddie nearly turns back. He doesn’t know what this means, he doesn’t, but he knows he can’t turn around. His gut tells him to go forward, and so he does.

He doesn’t know who they are. He thinks it could be Richie, maybe, or Beverly— he doesn’t remember, it could be someone, it could be anyone— so he asks, “If this is you, help—”

A crack of thunder shakes the world, the earth quaking underneath their feet, and the water surges up over their heads before draining down to their ankles. Everything goes black around them, but his eyes are still open, he knows it.

“Hello?” he asks. A hand lands on his shoulder.

* * *

The boys both have the flu, she thinks, but she manages to get them hydrated and resting on the couch by midmorning. They both fall asleep halfway through watching  _ Poltergeist,  _ and it takes waking Mike up a bit to get his help into pulling Will down the hall to his bedroom.

They collapse in bed together like they would when they were little. She takes a second to throw a quilt over the two of them, tucking it up around their shoulders. In the silence of the early afternoon, she pauses, just taking it in. It doesn’t escape her that she won’t have this for much longer, that Will has to leave soon just like Jonathan did, but she tries not to think too hard about it.

Joyce tries to keep herself occupied around the house, but it’s futile. There’s no point. She can’t help looking in on Will and Mike nearly every half an hour.

She’s got a nervous feeling itching at the back of her throat, but she can’t put words to it, so she doesn’t bother trying. All she knows is she wants to gag on the frustration and the fear that really has no place inside of her right now. She’s dealt with far worse than this, and yet the creeping sense of dread crawling through her as she twists her son’s doorknob yet again that afternoon is so intense, she feels like screaming.

She pushes the door open slowly, so it barely creaks. Will’s typically a heavy sleeper, but she knows he’s on alert, and a lifetime of sleepovers between Will and Mike have made it very clear that Mike is a much lighter sleeper than her son. As expected, he twitches when the door makes even the slightest squeaking sound, his brow furrowing. When he makes a soft noise, nearly like a sigh, Will reaches out and pats at his face, still asleep. It makes Joyce’s chest ache.

The floorboards don’t make any noise, only because she knows exactly which spots are the sturdiest and the quietest to creep across. When she crouches down next to Will, stroking his hair back from his face, he doesn’t move. Just keeps breathing evenly, his fingers splayed across his best friend’s face while they sleep, legs tangled up like they’re six again and not sixteen.

Down the hall, the phone rings. Joyce snaps her hand back, startled, but Will doesn’t move. Mike does, starting to blink his eyes open and ask, “Will?”

“Shh, it’s just me,” Joyce tells him. “Go back to sleep, Mikey.”

Mike squints at her for a second before he drops his head back into Will’s pillows, burying his face in the folds of the pillowcase. She rubs his shoulder before leaving the room, making sure the door is shut tight behind her. She jogs to the phone just in time to pick it up.

“Hello?” she asks. The phone rings again in her ear, and she frowns, pulling it away to look down into the receiver. For a brief moment, she’s terrified something will look back, but nothing does. Just empty black holes.

The phone rings twice more. She hangs up, then yanks it up again, pulling it to her ear.

“Hello?” she demands loudly.

_ “Hello?”  _ a voice echoes back down the line at her. She clenches her hand into a fist, narrowly stopping herself from pounding it into the wall in frustration.

“Can you answer me, please?” she says, raising her voice. She makes herself lower it enough so she won’t wake anyone up, but she’s starting to simmer with anger.

_ “Can you answer me, please?”  _ comes down the line, sounding far more desperate than she said it. She slams the phone down on the hook, heart racing.

It rings again.

She picks it up and says, “If this is you, Hop, try calling again.” Her own voice starts shimmering back to her, but it says,  _ “If this is you, help—” _ and her hand starts to shake.

“Try on Mike’s radio if you have to, okay?” she says, and hangs up again. The phone doesn’t ring another time. It takes a long moment for her to tear herself from the wall, waiting for it to ring again, but it becomes painfully clear it’s not going to, as much as she stares at it, waiting.

Something rings down the hall, she thinks. There’s only the one phone in the house, and her first thought is that it’s the radio. It might be the doorbell, though, she thinks.

Her vision fuzzes, and she frowns, gripping the wall next to the phone again. She feels her nails dig into the wallpaper like they’re not even hers, watching herself from above. Her feet move towards the door, but her head turns towards the hall. She has no idea why.

She tells herself to go to the door, to see if it’s Karen, maybe, or to go to Mickey’s room, to check and see if she’s okay. Her feet bring her right back to Will’s room, though.

Will’s standing up in the middle of the room, staring right at the mirror. Mike’s still fast asleep, sprawled out in bed; she has no idea how Will could have gotten away from him without waking him up, but he’s done it.

He reaches out, the very edges of his fingertips brushing the mirror, and the glass shatters into a million tiny pieces. On instinct, Joyce sprints forward, yanking Will back and turning him around, her back to the mirror, his face hidden in her chest, shoulders twisted to bring him down to her level. He starts crying, fisting his hands up in her shirt like he’s a toddler again.

“What, what is it?” she asks. He doesn’t answer, but she doesn’t need him to; the dread creeps through her just like she knows it’s creeping through him, a freezing awareness of something just beyond them, something she can’t see.

“Will?” Mike asks. Joyce and Will both turn to him, but his expression doesn’t change. The room shifts, blurring and rolling out of view over and over, flickering like a malfunctioning videotape. The scene scrolls by again and again, Mike walking closer, then through them, towards the window. Will starts to hyperventilate, his breath coming faster and faster, so Joyce pulls him in closer until he starts to catch himself.

“Will?” Mike shouts. Will lifts his head, starting to pull away from Joyce, but she hangs onto him tight.

“Mike!” Will shouts to him. “Mike, I’m right here, hey, hey, look at me! Mike,  _ look at me!” _

Joyce turns, trying to see what’s happening, where they are, or— or where they’re going, maybe, she doesn’t know. Mike scrolls away, and he’s replaced by a cloud of ash that explodes around them like a mushroom, just as earthen and just as rotten and just as living-but-dead.

The living thing eats up the dead things, until there’s nothing blue or bright left, until there’s just blackness. Joyce knows this place; she’s seen it before, and in nightmares since. It’s the Upside Down, the other side, and someone’s standing far in front of her.

She starts to move on instinct. She can hear— crying, she thinks. The closer she gets, the clearer the crying becomes.

At first, she thinks it’s Jane, but then she realizes it’s younger than Jane, still high enough to be younger than eleven or twelve, and she thinks that it’s Mickey. Ice floods her chest before she realizes she doesn’t actually recognize the crying, but whoever’s in front of her is holding a child.

She keeps walking, Will’s hand wrapped up in hers. She pulls him along step by splashing step, forward, always forward, water spraying up around to their knees as they go, until they’re close enough to see who it is that’s there with them. The air goes fuzzy again, charged like it was when their house shook, and that’s the only warning she gets to brace herself before the earth starts to tremble underneath their feet. The ground, not-ground of the Upside Down, it feels like it’s falling apart behind them, and she has no choice but to keep them moving forwards until they’re nearly running. They stop just short of the man, and everything feels like it comes to a freezing, frozen halt.

Time stands still. Over the man’s shoulder, Joyce makes eye contact with the child she heard crying. The girl sniffles, stops crying, and lifts her head, looking straight at her. Joyce starts to reach out for her, but Will grabs her, pulling her back.

Will starts to say something, but Joyce slips out of his grip and stretches just far enough that he can’t grab her again.

The girl keeps looking at her, but the voice Joyce hears isn’t hers. The man calls out straight ahead of him, into the ether of the Upside Down, desperate, and she recognizes his voice from the phone; he just shouts,  _ “Hello?”,  _ so desperate she can’t help but reach out to lay her hand on the man’s shoulder and turn him to her.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please PLEASE go look at the amazing art of Eddie and Joyce from this au by [PaperWarewolf on Twitter!!](https://twitter.com/PaperWarewolf/status/1291002433716527107?s=19)!!!!!!!! The greatest thing ever!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!


	4. capsize

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Eddie reaches out towards the woman. She looks exhausted and frightened, just as much as he feels, and he wonders if maybe the same thing that’s happening to him is also happening to her.
> 
> He taps the very tip of his finger to her hand, at the edge of her thumbnail, and she jerks back into living motion.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 👀👀👀👀👀

Eddie feels like time freezes around him, in this other place.

For a moment, the world is like a videotape put on pause. Laurie clings to him, her face buried in his shoulder, but she’s quieted down. The woman who grabbed Eddie by the shoulder and forced him to turn around has frozen, as well. A teenage boy stands right behind her, staring directly at Eddie when he looks up to him. Eddie’s instinct, though, is to protect Laurie, so he jerks back, out of this woman’s grip.

Water splashes around his ankles, but still, she doesn’t move. After a beat, he takes a hesitant step closer, leaning in to examine her face. Laurie still doesn’t speak, clinging tight to him; he has no idea if she’s similarly affected, frozen in time, or if she’s just paralyzed by fear. He’s terrified to check. Everything feels tenuously stuck to existence, like a dream that could disappear in a breath.

Eddie reaches out towards the woman. She looks exhausted and frightened, just as much as he feels, and he wonders if maybe the same thing that’s happening to him is also happening to her. He taps the very tip of his finger to her hand, at the edge of her thumbnail, and she jerks back into living motion.

“What do you want?” she demands from him. Laurie’s fingers tighten in his ragged shirt, torn still from the accident, her hands tangled at his collar as she hides her face in his neck.

“I want to go back home,” Eddie tells her, trying to tamp down on the panic screaming up the back of his throat.

“We’re in the Upside Down,” the teenager behind her says. The woman turns back to him, frowning. “I recognize it. I’ve been here, Mom.”

The woman takes her son’s hand and holds it tight before she turns back to Eddie and says, “How did you get here?”

“I don’t know,” Eddie tells her in a rush. Laurie turns her face out, just a bit, so she can watch the strangers as words spill out of Eddie’s mouth. “I was supposed to be taking my daughter to school but she got sick so we were going to the doctor instead and— God, we were in an accident, and—” Eddie stops, his memories fuzzing a bit. He blinks hard, looking down to Laurie in his arms, her head against his chest. “And then— I don’t know. We were in a… In a hospital, and my husband, we were— Oh, God—”

“Hey, okay, calm down,” the woman cuts him off. “It’s going to be fine. It’s— It’s fine. We can get out of here. Will— My son, this is my son, Will,” the woman motions the boy forward for Eddie to see, “he’s been here before. He’s come back from—” She stops, mid-sentence. She turns back to her son and says, “Jim will find us.”

“But there’s nowhere for him to go anymore,” Will says. “I don’t know if there’s a Door, or— or a Gate, I don’t know if there is one anymore.”

“There  _ has  _ to be, or else  _ none  _ of us would  _ be here right now,”  _ the woman insists, voice partly under her breath, partly forceful enough that Eddie can still hear it.

“That doesn’t mean I know how to get back,” Will tells her.

He’s about to start saying something else, but he stops for some reason. Eddie realizes why, in the next second, when he hears Laurie sniffling, too. He tips her face up by the chin.

“What if we can’t go home?” Laurie asks him tearfully before dissolving into tears. Eddie shushes her, kissing her forehead before he tucks her head back under his chin. His body is starting to ache again, splintering up his spine with pain; one of his arms has gone completely numb, but he tries to keep it tight on Laurie so she doesn’t fall.

“I’ll get you home, honey,” Eddie tells her firmly, with a confidence he doesn’t feel. She keeps crying, and Eddie’s chest aches with it. He looks up to the woman again; when they lock eyes, he can see the terror he feels lighting up his spine reflected back at him from inside her.

“We’ll find a way,” she tells them. Eddie nods, then staggers. The woman’s hand shoots out to grab him, wrapping an arm around his chest and shoving him back upright, leaning against his shoulder. “Will, help me—”

“Mom,” the kid said, choked. Eddie clutches Laurie close to his chest, clinging to her as he falls to his knees. “Mom, I think it’s ending. I think we’re getting pulled out—”

“Come and find us,” the woman tells Eddie. She falls to her knees beside him, grabbing his face in her hand. She reaches out for Laurie, too, cupping her face in his other hand, looking her hard in the eye. “You come find me. My name is Joyce Byers, this is Will Byers, and we live in Hawkins, Indiana. Do you hear me?”

“I’ll come find you,” Laurie answers. Eddie’s body is still on fire with pain; he can only feel one of his arms, now, the feeling completely gone on his left, so he just clings tighter to Laurie with his right. Through the pain, he’s only conscious of protecting her. In all of that, he thinks he really might die, and he doesn’t want that to happen while she could possibly be left somewhere alone, where she doesn’t know where she is or how to get home.

“Everything’s going to be alright,” Joyce tells them both. Eddie can barely see anymore; it feels like he’s looking at an illusion, two pictures overtop one another, worlds blurring together. In one world, he sees white fog and light and a whole lot of nothing. In the other world, there’s darkness and shadow and water and people, Joyce and Will and Laurie. Both terrify him, but he doesn’t feel like he has a choice in where he’s going to end up.

“It will,” Eddie manages to get out. He intends for it to be a statement, something that can maybe reassure these people, or at least reassure his daughter, but it comes out as more of a question. Joyce nods vigorously, as Eddie’s vision fully starts to blur away from the world he’d found himself in.

“It will,” Joyce says. “We’re going to figure it out. This must— This must mean something, and I’ll figure out what. I know I will. You come and find me. Check the phone books, you can— You can call me anytime,  _ anytime,  _ and I’ll answer. We’re going to figure this out, and I’m going to help you, hear that? I’ll help you.”

Eddie wants to tell her he’ll do the same, or say  _ anything,  _ but he’s losing his grip on the dark world and sliding back into the light one. In all of this, he struggles to cling to consciousness. It’s difficult, it’s nearing impossible, but he  _ does  _ try. More than that, he tries to hold tighter to Laurie, but he thinks— he  _ genuinely  _ thinks— that he just might be losing his grip.

**Author's Note:**

> You can (and should!) come chat with me on Twitter at [@nicole__mello](https://twitter.com/nicole__mello) and/or on Tumblr at [andillwriteyouatragedy](http://andillwriteyouatragedy.tumblr.com/).


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